


Assassins of France

by wolfchasing



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Assassins & Hitmen, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Assassin!Enjolras, Assassins & Hitmen, Human Trafficking, M/M, Past Abuse, Romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-06-11
Updated: 2013-06-11
Packaged: 2017-12-14 15:31:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,659
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/838493
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wolfchasing/pseuds/wolfchasing
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For years, Enjolras has been working to clean the scum from the criminal underground of France. Every bullet he fires is another life saved from abuse, toil, and pain. He's working a typical job, another scumbag trying to take another's freedom, when suddenly, everything about it goes wrong. Enjolras is pushed into a scheme far grander than his own life. Who is this mysterious 'R' character that keeps popping up?</p>
<p>TW: mentions of abuse, human trafficking, and blood.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Assassins of France

**Author's Note:**

  * For [FreudianSlippers](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=FreudianSlippers).



> This story has been written for Tumblr User FreudianSlippers. She wrote a request, my mind went haywire, and tahdah, we have my first fic in over a year. Apologies if it's a bit rusty; I'm a little out of practice.

In the idle time between setting up his rifle and waiting for his mark to come into his sights, Enjolras always chooses to reflect on his job. He doesn’t like to think of the early days; full of neglect and abuse; of fear, hunger, and never ending bruises at the hands of his tormentors. It’s remembering the later parts that he enjoys, that remind him of why he does this. Of how the fear turned into a rush of pure adrenaline as the sound of his first shot echoed around his head. Of how the hunger morphed into a desire to save others from his early life. Of how the only bruises he now receives is from the rifle kicking back into his shoulder.

Those three things are what keep him going. But on this particular job, they’re far from his mind. He’s belly down on a roof that hasn’t been cleaned in what feels like a hundred years. Several years’ worth of dead leaves, debris, and bird shit are sticking to the front of his coat, but that’s not what’s bothering him. It’s not the fog rolling in from the ocean, it’s not the fact that his tripod is a little wobbly (something he’ll have to fix as soon as he has the time), and it’s certainly not the fact that his mark is just a tiny bit handsome. He’s had to get over cute guys being in his sights before, and it isn’t bothering him now. No, there’s something just not sitting right in his gut about this job, and he can’t pinpoint what it is for the life of him.

He’d determined the mark after wandering around a particularly shady part of Paris; all graffitied walls, broken windows, and drug dealers. Enjolras had been listening, and he’d been moderately surprised to hear an impeccable, cultured accent amongst the myriad of the not-so-cultured ones. Seeking the owner of the voice, he’d been both appreciative and sceptical of what he saw. A tall man, with curly brown hair and a kind face, wearing grubby clothing that was completely at odds with the rest of the man. His hair was too clean, his teeth too straight and his shoes far too new for him to be a genuine resident of that particular sector of the city. In fact, the only thing that fit in was the faint whiff of wine and the constant swagger the man had

And so Enjolras had followed him and his suspicions paid off. He followed the man for days, cataloguing little pieces of data about the stranger; from what Enjolras had gathered, the man was intent on purchasing a woman. It riled Enjolras’ blood to see a man speak so casually about purchasing another human being, which was more than enough to make this stranger his next mark.

The man never gave his name, only supplying the moniker ‘R’ to whoever he spoke with. It was more than enough for Enjolras.

Enjolras followed the man across the country, jumping from town to town, switching cars in every major town he followed the man to. The chase finally ended in a dockyard in Cannes.

And now, here he was, knee deep in bird shit and sea scum, atop of some dingy old factory, completely unable to shake off the feeling that he’d gotten something completely wrong.

He was going to peruse this line of thought, when his mark’s car showed up on the docks. A silver Porsche pulled alongside Enjolras’ factory, the man completely throwing any previous act of shabbiness to the wind. Out stepped a man, the same man as before, but somehow, completely different. Instead of the battered hoodie and paint spattered jeans of before, there was a flawlessly tailored suit, steel grey and far flashier than anything Enjolras had seen him wearing before. The man, ‘R’, walked with a different step; any of the drunken swagger that Enjolras had seen just the previous day was gone.

This was to be the final stop for this ‘R’ character. To collect his ‘purchase’ and leave. Enjolras wasn’t going to allow that. The moment ‘R’ spoke to his contact, Enjolras would pull the trigger, and he would again revel in the fact that another foul mind was gone from the earth.

‘R’ walked across the dockyard, striding with purpose towards the abandoned shack directly opposite the warehouse. The strange man knocked once, twice, three times on the door, and walked towards the far end of the simple veranda, just as Enjolras had expected. He made a few subtle changes to his position, and lined up ‘R’s head within his sights.

There was something wrong. He was twitching, ever so slightly. Enjolras’ toe was wiggling, hardly enough to be called a twitch, but for a man with seven years of sniping experience, any bodily reaction out of the norm was to be taken into consideration. He eased his finger off the trigger, and chose to wait and watch instead.

From within the shack, a grubby man stepped out, with a cigar clenched between his teeth and gold chains looped around his neck and wrists. Enjolras almost laughed at the man who seemed to be the perfect caricature of a seedy thug. Two other men stepped behind out behind him, and Enjolras’ humour dissipated. Between the two thuggish creatures was a woman, slight and dark skinned, with obvious bruising and welts around her wrists that indicated poorly fitted shackles. Every ounce of Enjolras’ fury rose at the sight of the poor woman, and he absolutely itched to pull, but still, he waited.

There was some soft banter, and the man with golden chains stood right in the sweetest spot imaginable. It was that one right place where with a single depression of the trigger, the bullet would go shooting through both ‘R’ and the thug. Remiss to let such a sweet opportunity go by, Enjolras readied himself, bracing his shoulder and moving his finger back to the trigger.

Breathe in.

‘R’ moved, pulling his own gun and firing once, twice at the brutish thugs that dwarfed the small woman. Enjolras realised what was happening almost immediately. The way he had moved had allowed Enjolras to get a look at ‘R’s face. It was of complete and utter fury, all of it directed at the thugs. It was as if Enjolras had looked in a mirror to see his own rage reflected back at him on a different face.

Breathe out.

Before ‘R’ could swing around and take out the leading thug himself, Enjolras squeezed the trigger. The bullet flew, and the loud crack of the rifle echoed around the empty dockyard. The thug’s head snapped backwards, blood flying and splattering along the shack’s single, filthy window.

‘R’ immediately traced the bullet’s trajectory, but before he could do anything, three more goons popped out of varied hiding spots, converging quickly on the stranger. For a moment, Enjolras panicked, but his heart rate slowed when it became obvious that the mysterious ‘R’ was skilled in hand-to-hand. He immediately picked off the thug armed with a gun, firing his handgun almost casually, as if he were doing nothing more than strolling through a park. He made quick work of the remaining bruisers, disarming them of their baseball bats with ease and following up with a swift kick to the groin. As the men crumpled, ‘R’ quickly shot them both in their heads, entirely without remorse.

‘R’ immediately ran for the woman, who had slumped to the floor and began to weep. With their faces within his sights, Enjolras could easily read the lips of the woman, stumbling over _merci_ s and _terima kasih_ s.

‘R’ merely guided her over to his car, and now Enjolras could hear him. “I’ll take you to a police station. _Itu polisi_. Shh, it’s alright, yes, I’ll find your _saudara perempuan_ , you can trust me. I’ll take down those bastards. Shh.”

As soon as the woman was wrapped in a warm blanket and placed in the Porsche, ‘R’s kind face hardened, losing all emotion, glaring straight up where Enjolras was perched.

Enjolras was enthused. There was another like him, working against the criminal underworld and their crimes against humanity. But he was also wary; he hadn’t made quite a good first impression, with the whole busting in on ‘R’s operation thing.

Hurriedly, Enjolras pulled out his signature – a single piece of red cloth – and a Sharpie, and scrawled a simple message.

‘ _I like your style – Apollo_.’

Apollo was the name the criminal underground had given him when he first appeared on the scene – when he had first started taking down those who had committed crimes against the already-oppressed. He’d been spotted, his silhouette against the rising sun, and some particularly clever minded individual had dubbed the assassin ‘Apollo.’ It had stuck.

Enjolras dropped the fabric over the side of the building, watching as ‘R’s eyes followed the strip of material as it fluttered down the building and caught around the Porsche’s side mirror. Before he had the chance to gauge the stranger’s reaction, Enjolras was on the move, pulling away his gun, and packing it away quickly. With a few simple twists, the tripod was collapsed and shoved away into a backpack, alongside the case for his rifle. Running to the other side of the building’s roof, he jumped down to the emergency staircase and made his way down, jumping onto his motorbike and speeding away as fast as he could.

As he sped away, the wind whipping his hair about his face, Enjolras reflected on what had happened.

He wasn’t alone. He wasn’t the only one fighting against the scum of the earth. He wasn’t the only one set on liberating the people of France. Perhaps, if he found him again, he and ‘R’ could be allies.

He was also covered in bird shit.

Perhaps he should fix that before fantasising about fixing France.

**Author's Note:**

> Little translations:  
> Terima kasih - Indonesian for 'thank you'  
> Itu polisi - Indonesian for 'the police'  
> Saudara perempuan - Indonesian for 'sister'
> 
> If I got my words wrong, it's because I haven't studied Indonesian since 2009, and had to use Google Translate.
> 
> Our poor woman is Indonesian because, a) I was casting around my head for 'thank you' in other languages and Indonesian was the first to come to mind, and b) it's terrible, but human trafficking is quite the problem in Indonesia. It was one of the few things I recall learning about in Indonesian classes from years ago, and after doing a little research, I found this article: http://www.irinnews.org/report/97979/analysis-southeast-asia-s-human-trafficking-conundrum which was both interesting and saddening to read.
> 
> I know I'm dealing with somewhat touchy subject matter here, and if you feel I may have overstepped, let me know, and let me know what I can do to fix it. I'm sure I've been respectful, but we all make mistakes.


End file.
